First Binding
by antepathy
Summary: IDW Drift/Wing.  Drift wants Wing to teach him how to fight with blades.  There's...a requirement. Slash, sticky, modified shibari.
1. Chapter 1

IDW/G1  
Wing, Drift  
NC-17  
sticky, modified shibari  
A/N This isn't true shibari, but a sort of blending of it with a medieval knighthood ritual wherein the candidate would be bound to his sword overnight before he took his final vows.

1.

"Teach me." Drift tried to make it sound like a command, but Wing saw through it. As he always did.

"Why do you want to learn?" Wing asked, snapping the blue blades back into their housing. Drift had been watching him, at first arms folded, for the last cycle, run through an exhausting series of spins and slashes, dives and attacks and guards.

Why? Because Wing was exquisite precision when he wielded those blades. Because it was a weapon. Because it was something to do.

Drift shrugged.

"You'll have to do better than that," Wing said, laughing. "I had to do far more to convince them I was worthy."

Drift believed it, and could imagine a bit too easily Wing's earnest, impassioned harangue about helping others and protecting the weak. He…couldn't pull that off. Not with a straight face, not without purging. "Maybe I'm not 'worthy', then," he snapped.

Wing tilted his head. "I think you are. But you don't know it yourself."

Sometimes Drift resented how beautiful Wing was, how easily he moved, how easily he smiled. It would be so much easier to hate him if he didn't gift those smiles, that warm voice, so liberally on Drift himself, completely unselfconscious, unaware of his effect.

Wing considered for a moment, then snapped his blades back to life. He handed one to Drift with the easy gallantry that seemed to characterize everything he did. "I will teach you this much: the basic guards. So that you can defend yourself, if need be."

And will I need to? Drift asked. Wing shrugged, sensing the question, his smile quirking ironically at one side. "And if you desire more," Wing continued, as if Drift's ironic look simply hadn't happened, "We shall set about proving your worthiness to yourself."

[***]

"Name a color," Wing said. He was setting the Great Sword in some mounting in the ground of the small room he'd led Drift to, the sword's hilt jutting nearly at optic level. He bent, swiftly snapping stabilizing bands closed around the blade. Drift blinked, unsure of the purpose. Blade seemed pretty well set enough.

Wing straightened. "Color?"

"Red," Drift blurted, absently, his optics on a red swath of Wing's armor. Wing nodded, with a wry snort, crossing over to a panel, and withdrawing a coiled length of cable or rope, red. He handed it to Drift, before holding out his hands, wrists close.

"What?" Drift held the coil awkwardly. What were they even doing here? Wing had said something about worthiness and demonstrating something to him. He'd thought Wing meant the weapons. Not…whatever this was.

"It's the vigil," Wing explained. "If I am to teach you further, you must undergo it. It is our way."

"I'm not one of you," Drift retorted.

"If you want to join the brotherhood of the swords," Wing explained, patiently, "you must become one of us. At least this much."

"By…tying you up."

Wing laughed. "It's the ritual. It's required."

Drift snorted. "Symbolism."

"Not just that," Wing said. He moved his wrists. "Now, please? I will show you what I am asking you to do."

Drift stared at the wrists—slim yet powerful—then at the rope. He wanted to be bound like a common prisoner? With this archaic stuff? His choice. He took one end of the rope and began winding it in a figure-8 over and under Wing's outstretched wrists until he'd made a sort of woven band covering most of the light armor, before flipping direction and wrapping a coil over the intersection, reinforcing the center of the binding. "There," he said, whisking the end into a quick knot with the original end, the two long ends streaming like a tassel.

Wing surveyed it. "It's a good sign," he said, quietly, "That you took trouble to make it beautiful."

"I wasn't aware I was being graded on this."

"Always," Wing said, grinning. Then he dodged forward, lowering his bound hands between them, and placed a chaste kiss on Drift's mouth, teasing away the sting of his words.

By the time Drift had recovered from the surprise, his mouthplates tingling, Wing had turned to where the sword was planted, fixed in its bracket. His broad backspan looked naked without it, Drift thought, bare and…vulnerable. Wing turned, raising his arms over his head, angling his elbows, and sank slowly to his knees, catching his wrist binding over the pommel of the sword, so that his arms were held, immobilized, over his head.

"And now what?" Drift said. This didn't look like a very cute trick.

"We wait," Wing said, his voice taking on the hushed reverence it did when they spoke of swords.

"How long?"

"Until morning."

All night. They'd be here all night. "You're…going to stay tied to a stupid sword all night."

Wing smiled. "Yes."

"Why." Beyond that the Circle of Light's ways were…fraggin' bizarre. And he was not going to stoop to this idiocy himself. Part of him wanted to snatch one of Wing's short blades, sever the binding. Just to prove how empty the ritual was. Just to desecrate. Just to destroy. But Wing's next words froze him.

"For what it teaches me about myself."

"That you're an idiot who ties himself to his sword." Half-hearted. What did his desire, knee-jerk, almost innate, to destroy teach him?

Wing laughed, possibly seeing the flash of dark emotion across Drift's face. Drift rocked back, stung.

"I will remain here all night, as the ritual requires," Wing said, softly, after a moment. "You do not have to stay with me. But I'd appreciate if you'd return come morning." His smile turned rueful. "I cannot unbind myself without your help."

Drift studied Wing, his face going through a half-dozen emotions. "I'll stay," he muttered, not entirely sure why.

Wing bowed his head. "I thank you. The ritual can be…disturbing. I want you to see it before I ask you to undergo it."

Drift's comment about how ludicrous it sounded that being tied to a sword was 'disturbing' died in his vocalizer in the face of Wing's earnestness. He nodded, gruffly.

"You may talk to me," Wing said, quietly, "But there is a good chance, after a while, that I may not hear. Please do not consider it rude." His gold optics were importunate, wanting Drift to understand. Drift nodded again. Wing returned the nod, his version gentle, slow, and then his optics seemed to dim, his ventilation changing, slow and deep and even.

Drift hesitated, watching Wing, his optics mapping strain points. There was no way Wing would stay here all night. After a while, his shoulder gyros would begin to overheat from the upward pressure, his wrists' energon lines compressed by the binding and by gravity would turn his hands into blazing nets of pain. His knees, the strain to his ventilation pumps…. Stupid, Drift thought. Silly thing to do for a little while. But for cycles? Wing will be in agony. Stupid, needless, pointless agony.

And he was supposed to agree to this?

He found himself studying Wing, his optics dipping from the serene silver face to the white and red armor, to the long red tassels of the rope behind his back, the broad line of the sword rising above Wing's head, framed by his sleek elegant sweeps of his white arms. Wing was…beautiful. He'd seen Wing animated, active, the face lit with personality, optics gleaming with some merriment, but even now, even still, his optics dimmed, lidded, his face performing for no audience, he was…breathtaking. Especially because he was for no audience but solely breathing, thinking, being, for himself.

What did that feel like? What did it mean? Drift didn't think he'd ever felt whatever it was Wing was feeling. Didn't know if he even could feel at that level, that quiet, that peace.

The night stretched. Wing's ventilations grew shallower, his face flickering with some ephemeral pain. Drift paced, restless, Wing's still discomfort somehow making him edgy.

Wing whimpered, softly, his optic shutters flicking, flexing his hands helplessly in their bindings, squirming his shoulders, trying to loosen the joints, his wings slowly unfolding, shivering.

"Wing?" Drift whispered.

Wing mumbled something, head lolling to one side. His hips rose, thigh actuators firing into his knees, attempting to release the hydraulic compression. It was captivating to watch, almost sexual, Wing's squirming helplessly for release, his entire body stretched, wracked, exposed, as though his pain were gorgeous, to be admired.

Drift's sensor net tingled, wanting in sharp, short scintillant bursts. His hands burned, wanting to slick down those intricate white shapes, to pull out the wings again, examine them, soothe them.

Soothe. Drift soothing anyone? Ridiculous.

Wing writhed, his lashed hands twisting together around the sword's hilt. The whimpering turned to moaning, the sound somehow vibrating right through Drift's systems, like blazing oil. He undulated against the bindings, his wings scraping against the sword's bracket, his thighs surging upward.

Drift dropped to a knee beside him, worried. This…had to be something going wrong. "Wing," he repeated, stretching one hand out.

Wing mumbled again, turning his face blindly to the sound of Drift's voice. "I want," he murmured. "I want…."

"What? What do you want?"

Wing groaned, his knees firing, arching his entire body up, shoulders twisted behind him, for a handful of kliks before he subsided, sobbing.

"What?" Drift asked, louder. He touched Wing's shoulder.

Wing hissed, recoiling, as though Drift's touch was agony, nearly falling to one side, overbalanced, only the binding of his wrists keeping him upright. Drift jumped back, startled.

The gold optics flicked open, but they were hazy, unfocussed. "No," Wing murmured. "Can't touch. Please." Drift watched as Wing hauled against his bindings, pulling himself up, righting his legs under him, burnt and bitter with apology.

The night dragged on, Wing…tormented. It almost defied belief that Wing—white, pure, serious, intense, smiling Wing, could have so many mental demons assault him, but Drift could find no other explanation for how or why Wing went through what he did—moaning rising to, at times, shrieks that rattled Drift's audio, jarred him to the base of his cortex, tore at his spark, or heartrending sobs, half-coherent apologies and pleas. Drift felt a dull anger rise, unfocused, untargeted, on Wing's behalf, wishing he had an enemy to strike, something to HURT, something to deliver Wing's pain back upon.

Finally, Wing subsided, sagging in his bonds, head bowed, spinal struts curved, his tortured wrists and shoulders bearing the strain of his weight, his ventilation shallow ragged gasps, almost panting, that seemed to ebb even then.

A bar of the false-light the underground city used to mark daylight stabbed through the narrow room's only window, touching Wing's knee. Wing didn't seem to notice. But, Drift thought, he said until morning. It was morning.

He knelt in front of Wing, careful not to touch this time. "Wing," he said, insistently, pitching his voice, hoping to rouse the other. "Wing."

Wing raised his head, optics bleary. He looked exhausted, wrung out, but the smile was trying, vainly, valiantly, to spread on his lips. "Morning," he murmured.

Drift nodded.

Wing blinked slowly, clarity slowly returning to his gaze. "Help me rise?"

Drift scooped forward, catching his shoulder against Wing's chassis, arms around the rib struts, stepping in and lifting. Wing struggled to get his legs under him, but the servos were weak, exhausted, depressurized from the night's exertions. He curled toward Drift as Drift reached over, guiding the bound wrists over the top of the sword's hilt as gently as he could manage. Wing's face found a home against Drift's throat, pressing in, seeking comfort.

Drift stepped back, one hand cupped around Wing's back as the other mech wobbled. Drift reached for the binding, half turned away from Wing, Wing's body leaned on his, as he worked over the knot swiftly, the red ends whipping through the air as he unwound it as swiftly as he could. Wing whimpered, lowering his arms gingerly, energon burning back through them. He felt Wing shudder against him, lean on him, press into him. The stabilizers on Wing's knees slid against his thighs, quivering, unsteady. Wing nuzzled into him, hands cold and stiff and numb, but his face was warm on Drift's shoulder. He half-carried Wing over to the narrow alcove, thinking...could I do this? Was Wing stronger than I? He didn't know, but he wanted to try.

Wing's arms twined around him, the air around him electric, charged, his optics golden pools of some deep emotion Drift could not read as he pulled Drift down with him, laying his frame out along the alcove's space, along Drift's body. And Drift's body responded, the pent up frustration and helplessness from the night before transmuting to desire. His hands were rougher than he might have liked on Wing's body, pulling their bodies together, reaching for the folded wings, one leg pushing between Wing's white thighs.

Wing's mouth met his, hungrily, and it was not the gentle, meek Wing he knew, but something forceful, aggressive, and yet, still, somehow utterly Wing. Wing arched into Drift's fingers as they pulled at his wings, pushing himself over on top of Drift's frame. "Please," Wing murmured, his hand snaking down to Drift's interface hatch. Drift pushed his chassis up, making room between their bodies for Wing's hand, the hatch opening smoothly, eagerly. He twitched at Wing's fingers—hot from the returning power flow—on his valve cover, asking, entreating. He released it, without thought, not thinking of what it meant so much as just wanting to give Wing what he wanted, that somehow, that was important right now. Wing's head bowed against his shoulder, a mute acknowledgement of Drift's actions, like a gift, before he shifted his own body.

Drift gasped as Wing's spike pushed into him, feeling a wash of association—flashes of pain, humiliation, rage, power and force, triumphant sadism. But Wing was none of those, none of that, and the flashes faded to a gentle, warm pleasure. Wing's motion was slow, tender, not thrusting in as much as ebbing and flowing, surging and releasing, slow and careful, desire without urgency. And Wing's hands were gentle on him, and Wing's mouth was shy and wanting against his, and Wing's body was a stress-heated satin-skinned presence riding over him. Wing's EM field reknit itself slowly with the charge from their contact, his hands grazing Drift's body, as though touch made him real.

Drift's hands tugged at the wings, feeding his own need, the desire to touch Wing that had grown overnight into something like an absolute. Wing shivered , his overload not the hard burst Drift knew, but elongated, as if someone had taken the moment of overload and stretched it between their hands, keeping the same sharp sweet intensity. It was bliss, pure and so sweet it hurt, almost too much for Drift to bear, his hands clutching at Wing, his mouth falling away, stretched open as though he couldn't contain it all. Wing's face over his was the face of one long lost finding direction, his golden optics like twin suns.

Wing eased down onto Drift's frame. "Thank you," he murmured, but blocked any reply, his mouth drowsily seeking a kiss, nipping gently at Drift's mouthplates before sliding off to one side, overtaken by exhaustion.

Drift held him, spike still warm and throbbing in his valve, folding his arms over the naked swordless backspan, as the white light of the false day played over Wing's armor, making him blaze and shimmer like a mirage.


	2. Facing the Blade

PG-13  
IDW/G1 Drift miniseries  
Wing/Drift  
graphic descriptions of 'torture'? bondage/modified shibari, vaguely disturbing stuff  
A/NThe Sioux tribes often practiced ritual suspension during Sundances, which takes the notion of enduring pain as a method of gaining spiritual power (as a warrior tribe) much, much further than I do here.

"Yes," Drift said, simply. He'd waited until later, waking Wing reluctantly, when the pull of hunger was too much. And he'd thought that if he was on reserves, Wing must be beyond them. He placed another cube of energon before Wing, jutting his chin in a command. Drink.

"I'm not done with this one," Wing said, meekly, holding up his first cube.

"Then drink faster."

Wing grinned. "You did used to command, didn't you?"

Drift frowned, but then pulled himself back on topic. "I said, yes."

Wing nodded. "I heard you. Why?" His optics shuttered, gratefully, after another sip, holding the cube tipped against his mouth.

To prove I can handle it. To prove I'm not weak. If Wing could do it; I can. Drift's temper flared but he heard himself say, "I want to know."

Wing tilted his head back down, laying the empty cube beside him on the berth. "Yes," he said. "It can be terrifying the first time."

It looked pretty fragging terrifying whatever time it had been for Wing. But Drift stilled the swirl of what he'd hate to label fear. He was not afraid. He was not weak. He would prove it. He managed a shrug.

"I will not leave you," Wing said. "Sometimes, that is a comfort."

Drift wanted to refuse it, to snarl away Wing's offer, but, with the memory of Wing's shuddering body still alive across his sensornet, he couldn't.

"When?" he said, pushing.

"Always impatient," Wing said, optics bright, before adding, softly. "Tomorrow. I need to recover." He spread one hand, taking the blame for the delay—Drift saw through the feint.

"You don't think I'm ready."

"I think you are. I regret the delay. But, honestly." Wing's optics met his, level, clear and pure. "I am the one who is not ready."

Drift growled but subsided, remembering Wing, wracked, blind. He nodded, finally, not that he had any choice. But it struck him, suddenly, the pains Wing was going through, had gone through since his arrival, to preserve his dignity, his sense of self-control. Even now, barely recovered, he was solicitous of Drift.

And it struck him that a few days ago—even yesterday, perhaps—he would have found such concern something between an insult and a weakness.

[***]

"Black," Wing said, "I think black." He plucked the black coil from the shelf, turning to where Drift stood, awkwardly, wanting to get it started. He knew he wouldn't back down—he'd never backed down. But he wanted this…over.

"Why black?"

Wing held out the rope. "The colors have meanings. They represent our greatest challenges."

Drift frowned. "What's black mean?" He thought back, guiltily, to his completely random choice for Wing's binding.

Wing smiled. "You'll tell me in the morning."

Drift grunted, but what had he expected? A typical Wing answer. "What does red mean?" he countered.

Wing dipped his head, a little, for once, embarrassed. "Emotion," he said, quickly, as if trying to get the word out as swiftly as possible, afraid that it might cut him. Wing gestured for Drift's hands. "Ready?"

Drift put his hands out, approximating the position Wing had. Wing's knotting was…just like Wing—fast, elegant and ornate. Cuffs looped Drift's wrists, joined in the middle by a long bridge of two strands which Wing held like a lead. Wing showed a drooping loop near Drift's thumb. "If the compression gets too tight, this will release some slack into the binding."

Drift's binding hadn't had that. "Won't need it," he said.

Wing tilted his head. "This is how the first Binding is done, for everyone, Drift."

Drift growled. "Won't need it," he repeated.

Wing simply nodded, then tugged at the long ends, to where he'd sunk his sword in the same bracket as before. "Kneel," he directed, "Facing the blade."

"But—"

Wing shook his head. "This is how the first Binding is done."

"Have a feeling I'm going to get sick of that sentence." Drift dropped to his knees, holding his bound arms out obediently.

Wing chuckled, flipping the long center strand in a loop around the pommel. "Probably."

Drift shifted on his knees, testing positions. Wing waited, keeping in his line of sight, until he settled. "You can talk," he said, "and I will answer. Nothing you say leaves this room." Wing squatted down, one of his knee stabilizers brushing Drift's shoulder. "Nothing you say leaves me, ever." His optics blazed. Drift nodded, but he had the feeling that he…didn't understand it at all. Wing nodded, brusquely, stepping around the blade, throwing his arms around Drift's shoulders, his cheek rubbing against Drift's audio. Drift could feel the heat and the weight of him, like a blanket, behind him. "I will not leave you," Wing whispered, and the voice was like cool silk sliding over Drift's systems.

Wing stepped away. Drift could hear him moving around behind him, quietly, almost retreating. Drift tried to settle himself in. The sword's silver blade confronted him: his newly blue optics cast dual reflections back at him, sharp and clear on the honed metal of the blade. The bindings pulled his arms up—he could feel the slowing pulse of his energon circulation system in his forearms. He turned his head, trying to loosen his neck servos—no way they were already tight.

He waited, trying to ape Wing's deep, calm ventilation, forcing air through his vents. His optics fixed on their reflections on the sword's broad surface: blue and hard. Unfamiliar, uncomfortable. Autobot optics. He studied his face, the contours still his, but…unfamiliar. To be honest, he'd never spent much time looking at himself. Always survival and then after that, always a battle.

Now, no battles, no survival, only his face, unavoidable, a hand-span in front of him. His face…what Wing had seen and trusted, implicitly. What had Wing seen in it?

He stared some more and his face seemed to change, somehow, the reflection writhing, altering, the mouth twisting into one of Deadlock's hardened sneers, one of gutter-rat Drift's pinched, hungry looks. He felt his throat tightening, his vocalizer crackling static.

"Are you well?" Wing's voice, soft, pitched so low that Drift could pretend not to hear it, that it wouldn't interrupt.

"Fine," Drift breathed, trying to force the images away, trying to make his face his face again, but failing.

"If I may offer advice," Wing said, moving slowly, quietly just into the edge of Drift's periphery, a white ghost of an image. Drift's optics flung themselves toward the white glow hungrily. "Do not fight it, Drift. Let it happen."

"Not fighting." A lie, and he could hear the sound of the lie, a flat sour note, and he knew Wing could hear it, too.

A pause, Wing trying to think of what to say, and then, "You always make things harder on yourself than you need to, Drift." The voice was soft with affection, pulling any sting or judgment from the words. He paused for a moment, before stepping away, moving close enough that Drift could feel the soft brush of his EM field against him as he moved, leaving Drift to his pain.

Because…it had begun to hurt now, a buzz starting from across his shoulders, the struts jammed at the upper end of their range, and spreading through his whole body, a grey murky static with flashes of white, like a thunderstorm. It seemed to have mass and depth, it made its own noise, a loud rumbling buzz that seemed to rise like a wall of fog between Drift and everything else but the blue glow of his reflected optics.

And it struck him that Wing was right. That he was fighting, making this harder than it had to be. But also…that he knew no other way. That the very core of him was a fighter. The most basic parts of who and what he was was resisting something. Without that…?

He heard a sound, a high keen, like a flash of one of Wing's energy blades, slicing through the darkness, realizing slowly that it was coming from him. He repulsed from the sound, at first, but it seemed to fill him, the sound clean and pure. A sound of pain, but a sound honest about it, not pretending to be anything else, not disguised as music.

He shifted forward, almost without thought, without will, as though his body overrode his conscious process, leaning him forward until he felt the cold metal of the Great Sword against his brow. His ventilations were ragged, uneven, rattling from his ducts, his arms shaking, somehow heavy and weightless at the same time.

Drift's awareness shrank, reduced, to the limits of his own body, to the sheer volume of pain he seemed capable of holding. Time seemed to cease, space seemed to fall away, until he could not even feel the floor under his shins, and the bindings on his wrists were merely lines of constriction.

Sometimes he thought that the sound of Wing's footfalls was the only thing keeping him sane, letting him feel that time was passing, that he was not caught, trapped in some chrysalis of agony. He forced himself to continue, one of Wing's footsteps at a time, thinking no further, promising no further than surviving until the next footfall. And he thought, dimly, that Wing must know this somehow, with how long and how steadily he paced.

Let go, Drift. Feel the pain, don't hide from it. Let it wash over you. The pain is not you. Feel the emotions that come with the pain and...let them go. Let them go, Drift. And Wing's voice was a caress, a cool hand on his hot systems. And Wing had endured this.

And it struck Drift that…Wing had not spoken. That the voice that sounded like Wing, soft and warm and gentle, was…not from outside.

He felt something, sharp, electric, surge through him, something welling up from some place deep inside him, rushing toward his vocalizer. His hands clutched, closing around the dangling ends of his binding rope, the powerful something tearing from his throat, feeling like it was exploding from his armor, blasting his EM field.

He clung to the rope, feeling the cool blade heat under his helm, feeling his own overheated net stir around him, pain like a red grey haze. He wasn't sure how much he could take.

Weak. You're weak.

No. I'm not. I'm not weak. I'm a survivor.

I'm weak. I can't take anymore.

One more footstep. One more. Hold out one more.

He could not imagine how this could hurt…this much. Boundless agony, relentless, shifting with every move he made to ease himself, like an enemy with faultless parries, driving the advantage, driving Drift before him, forcing Drift to exhaust himself, toying with, mocking, Drift. His shoulders burned, his knees burst out throbs of pain into the floor, like sonic pulses, his wrists seemed icy and tight, his fingers, each of them, alive with cold swollen fire. Ventilation hurt, moving hurt, sitting still hurt, looking hurt. Everything. There was no surcease.

"You're very brave," Wing murmured, the voice so gentle it seemed to penetrate like slow waves, as if he could somehow sense, feel what Drift was going through. And it was Wing's voice, outside him, a small link of connection, the words he most wanted, needed to hear..

Drift tried to respond, but only a groan came out. No. Not brave. Weak. He knew he would break, could feel it rising, cresting, ready to crack and split like fatigued metal. And after? Annihilation. Ground to nonexistence. Pain twisted higher around him, as though he were enveloped in flames, charring and scorching, making him brittle, fragile. And with a sudden rush, as though being pushed off a cliff top, he…

…broke.

It was as if he vanished, everything he thought and said he was, everything he believed he stood for, everything he'd spun into the core of his life simply collapsed, cracked open like an egg, revealing emptiness. Oblivion. Nothing. No pain, no sensation at all. No thoughts, no feelings. Just…awareness. Beyond time, beyond judgment.

If he didn't know better, he might have called it 'peace'.

[***]

Sensation blazed over his net, abruptly, blinding him. His systems wailed, orienting him harshly. Up/down, left/right, weight and mass, systems popping to his awareness.

"It's morning. Drift. It's morning." Wing's voice, gentle in his audio, repeating the same phrase over and over, until it had finally penetrated. Drift's optics cycled on, and he saw Wing, kneeling down on the far side of the sword's bracket. Wing's optics were the most welcoming light he'd seen, brighter and gentler than the false-sunlight that jabbed through the window. Wing's right hand rested on the knot between Drift's two slack hands. Drift grunted. "I wanted to make sure you were functional before I unbound you," Wing said. "Some mechs fear that they were released too early, as some…mercy."

Drift frowned, motion coming stiffly to his facial plates, but he knew he was in that category. If he'd woken up on a berth, he'd have presumed failure. Pity. Weakness.

Wing's mouth pulled into a matching frown. "I…was tempted." He let his thumb brush one of Drift's fingers. "I'm sorry." He straightened, abruptly, tugging on some part of the knot Drift couldn't see, and suddenly, the whole thing seemed to fall slack, his hands dropping, limp. Wing took one hand, swiftly pulling apart the bound cuff. Drift could feel the warmth of Wing's fingers, holding his energon-starved cool palm, fingers pecking like birds at the binding, and it sent a shiver of silver through him.

The hand dropped slack to slap against his dark thigh as Wing repeated the motion on his other wrist, holding onto that hand for a trifle longer than necessary before releasing it, with a flash of self-consciousness.

Drift rocked forward, bracing his weight on his hands, which nearly burned with the pain of returning energy flow, the actuators stiff and unfired, as he struggled to his feet. He would get up by himself, and he knew Wing read that in his posture, stepping out of the way.

Drift rocked forward, half-upright, grabbing for the arm that Wing automatically extended, accepting that much assistance. His legs felt new, weak, and yet somehow clean, as though they had been stripped and refit, as he moved slowly to the small alcove, where, two mornings before, he had helped Wing. Wing hesitated, standing nearby, ready to turn and leave Drift to some privacy.

But…Drift had had enough of privacy, enough of being locked to the confines of his own skin. And maybe it was a weakness, but it was a weakness Wing would never reveal.

He touched Wing's hand, and the jet turned, like a flower chasing the sun, folding down around Drift onto the flat dais. Drift's hands were hard on Wing's body, driven by a desire to feel, to engage in the outside world, to remap the contours of himself. Wing purred, obligingly, dipping his face into Drift's throat, murmuring, "And black? Did you discover what it stands for?"

Drift nodded, letting the gesture travel through contact. Yes, he'd learned.

Need.


End file.
